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Healthy Eating
Cookery Club
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This is a club which is run voluntarily by Mrs West and Mrs Morris
(two of our outstanding teaching assistants). Over the course of
the year we aim to provide all of our Year 2 children with the
opportunity of taking part in this fantastic cooking course for a
programme of six one hour sessions after school. The
children enjoy making many delicious and healthy snacks and meals,
from fruit salad to shepherd’s pie. Where possible, ingredients are
fresh, local and seasonal.
Gardening Club
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All children in Year 1 are given the opportunity of taking part in a
course of six one hour gardening sessions after school. The children
enjoy planting and growing various items, including vegetables and
herbs. We have regular winning entries in local growing competitions
for schools, including ‘Best Hanging Baskets’, ‘Tallest Sunflowers’
and ‘Biggest Pumpkins’. We have also earned our ‘School
Environmental Gold Award’ in association with Farnham in Bloom and
this year we are entering the ‘South and Southeast in Bloom’
competition for the first time. The children certainly learn a great
deal about planting and growing but most importantly they take away
with them an enthusiasm for gardening and growing their own produce.
Our thanks go to Mrs. Mansfield and Mrs. West for their fantastic
efforts in running this club voluntarily after school.
Fruit and
Vegetable Scheme (Click
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The school takes part in the Surrey fruit and vegetable scheme,
where children are provided with fresh fruit or vegetables as a
snack at morning play. This is very popular with the children and is
certainly providing them with an extra portion of fruit or
vegetables each day.
Christmas party
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This is an annual festive treat when all classes in the school sit
together in party clothes and hats and share a wonderful range of
food before enjoying their party games. The food is cleverly
organised so that each class provides a different type of food, such
as sandwiches, cakes, fruit and vegetables or savoury snacks. This
ensures a balance between healthy foods and treats. Many parents
spend a great deal of time producing lovely home baked treats and
the beautifully arranged fresh fruit and vegetables look and taste
fantastic!
School meals
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Our
catering service provides healthy, balanced meals with fresh fruit
and vegetables and fresh baked bread each day. We provide regular
information for parents about our school meals as well as tasting
opportunities; menus are sent home each term, the cook brings her
fresh baked biscuits and bread to our new parents meetings, and the
children can opt to have a ‘one off’ lunch on our special
‘Healthy Heart’ promotion days in school. Currently around half
of our children have school lunches and this has risen from around
one quarter; 66% of our children enjoyed the last ‘Healthy Heart’
lunch. Of course the strongest influencing factor is that the meals
are lovely and the children really do enjoy their school lunches;
roast dinner each Wednesday is a particular favourite.
Food Awareness
Week
Once a year we enjoy ‘Food Awareness Week’. The
children take part in many exciting and educational activities all
centred around the theme of healthy eating. Our favourite activities
include the following:
• Café Lea: This is a healthy café serving pizzas and smoothies
where children are the chefs, waiters/waitresses and customers.
• The children design their own laminated A3 placemat, promoting a
healthy balance, which they can take home.
• The children make their own fruit kebabs.
• A visit from Waitrose: Staff from Waitrose bring a wonderful
display of fresh fruit and vegetables, arranged according to their
colour. They explain the nutritional value of each colour group and
give samples of unusual fruits for the children to taste. It is a
very interesting and educational experience for all!
Free fresh water
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During the summer term of 2007, the Friends of Badshot Lea Village
Infant School provided all children with a free water bottle. Since
then, each new intake of children in Year R are provided with their
first school water bottle, kindly paid for by the Friends. Parents
are encouraged to purchase replacement lids from the school office
at a cost of 50 pence, or alternatively a new bottle costs £1.50.
The children bring their water bottles to school each day. They are
kept inside the classrooms so that the children are able to drink
water through the day as and when they need to. We also plan to
install a new drinking fountain in the playground.
Cake stall
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The Friends of Badshot Lea run various functions during the year and
we always have a stall where people can buy food and drink. Since
achieving Healthy Schools Status we have made sure that we
always offer healthy options as well as cakes and biscuits. Our
‘fruit cups’ always prove to be very popular with the children.
Physical Activity
Developing our
School Grounds (Click
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An enthusiastic and hard working team of parents and staff have
spent two long evenings after school tidying and improving our
school grounds. Their efforts were rewarded by a feast of barbeque
food. We are lucky to have such beautiful and extensive school
grounds, ideal for promoting physical activity and imaginative play.
Our New All Weather Path
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We are very proud of our new all weather path around the school
field. This links the playground areas with the new pedestrian gate
and allows children to enjoy all year round access to all our
wonderful play areas, also extending their learning opportunities.
The Trim
Trail (Click
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The
children love climbing on our fantastic trim trail. Each class
group looks forward to their turn once a week and the children
benefit enormously from the physical activity and challenges it
promotes.
Active Play (Click here
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Our children do not need to be encouraged to be active, given the
right space and opportunities they just make the most of our
wonderful range of play equipment during their playtimes and
lunchtimes.
Soft Play
and Sensory Area
The children are very lucky to have this beautiful new indoor soft
play area. All children enjoy access to this fabulous resource, but
children in the school’s special needs unit benefit particularly
from the physical stimulation this equipment provides.
Display of local
clubs and activities Click here to see our
directory
Each year we write to all our parents inviting them to recommend
local clubs and activities that their children enjoy. This
information is compiled to up-date this page on our website; our own
local directory of clubs and activities for children, recommended by
parents and children at our school. The benefits of children doing
physical activities out of school are numerous, and the extra
activity contributes towards each child’s recommended 60 minutes of
physical activity each day. This information is particularly useful
to families that are new to the area.
Waverley and Ash School Sports Partnership
Our school is part of a group of local schools who get together
regularly for sports activities and competitions. This involvement
in extra-curricular sports has enabled us to achieve our
‘Activemark’ award for 2007 and 2008. Children from years 1 and
2 regularly visit All Hallows School for a number of different and
enjoyable sports activities. These include biathlon competitions,
rounders tournaments and sports coaching events for gifted and
talented children.
Sports Day (Click
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This is an occasion we look forward to every year. It is held on a
Saturday and is combined with our summer garden party. We are
particularly proud of our new format where the children are
organised into mixed age teams and they compete against other teams
in a circuit of novelty races. Points are awarded at the end of
every race and there is a winning team at the end. The children
dress up according to a theme for their team and parents are able to
follow their children as they move around the circuit. All children
are involved and active during every timed race and the spectacle is
a feast for the eyes of every proud parent.
Achievement Board
We have a display board in the school hall where achievements in
physical activity are celebrated. There are certificates and
photographs of children for achievements in swimming, football and
many more activities. The children feel very proud to have their
achievements recognised and it encourages other children to take
part in physical activities too.
Travel Plan
Our
school travel plan is in place and has worked to increase walking to
school and improve safety for pedestrians in our locality. We have
a new pedestrian gate providing a safe entry onto the school site
for our walking bus and we have extended the zigzag lines outside
the school entrance which keeps parked vehicles further away from
this area.
Golden Boot
Challenge
The school took part in the Golden Boot Challenge, a Surrey County
Council Scheme, for four weeks to encourage ‘greener’ modes of
travel to school. This was very successful and the Village of
Badshot Lea has felt very different both during the Golden Boot
Challenge and, importantly, continuing afterwards with far fewer
cars parking close to the school in the mornings and afternoons.
Walking Buses &
Park and Stride (Click
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During our Golden Boot Challenge in June 2007 we trialled a
‘Walking Bus’ and ‘Park and Stride’ scheme. These were
so successful that they have been operating every day (weather
permitting), morning and afternoon, since September 2007. We run
two walking buses, one to Badshot Lea Village Infant School and the
other to William Cobbett Junior School. There are many families
with children at both schools and the walking buses enable us to
walk our children to both schools safely instead of jumping in our
cars in order to drop off and collect all our children on time. We
have analysed our registers and found that during a ‘normal’ week in
November (2008) our walking buses saved a total of 156 car
journeys. We feel that this is very worthwhile and we are all
certainly benefiting from the extra physical activity walking
provides.
Scooter Park
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We have a scooter park, located just inside the school entrance, to
enable children to scoot to school, leave their scooter at school
during the day and scoot home in the afternoon. This has proved very
popular and the children are benefiting from the extra physical
activity scooting provides. Many children are enjoying scooting
quite long distances to school and parents are happy that they no
longer need to carry (or ride) their children’s scooters home again
in the morning and back to school in the afternoon each day!
Personal, Social and Health Education and
Emotional Health & Well Being
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Personal, Social and Health Education &
Emotional Health and Well Being
Star of the Week
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Each Friday our children come to school wondering who will
be ‘Star of the Week’ this time? Their
teachers choose children from each class who have done
particularly well that week and deserve special praise. In
assembly the teachers reveal their chosen Stars of the Week
and they are given a special badge to wear. The younger
children also have the privilege of taking home their class
toy for the weekend. Each child is photographed and their
special reason for being Star of the Week is recorded in our
beautiful Album. These albums have become treasured
mementos and are kept in the headteacher’s office.
School Council
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Two children have been chosen to represent each class on our
‘School Council’. They have either been elected by
their peers, through a secret ballot, or in the case of our
reception class and special needs unit they were selected by
their teachers. They meet regularly to discuss important
matters, and later they report back to their classes. This
process enables the children to voice their ideas and
opinions, and influence decisions about aspects of school
life that really matter to them, such as playtime activities
and choosing new school equipment.
Friendship Benches
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We have purchased three lovely benches which are known as
our ‘Friendship’ benches. They have been beautifully
carved with pictures of wildlife and placed in our new
wonderful ‘sensory garden’. The children understand that if
they feel sad or lonely then they can go and sit on these
benches; this will signal to other children that someone
needs friendly company, and soon they will be joined by
thoughtful and caring friends.
The Christmas Play
Each year we put on three performances of our whole school
Christmas play. The staff and children work extremely hard
to make this annual production a magical event for all who
watch it or take part in it. The theme of ‘Every Child
Matters’ could not be more apparent as every child in
the school, including those in the schools special needs
unit, has their moment on the stage. It is breath-taking to
watch as the children and staff orchestrate this amazing
event. You can see in each child’s face their growing
confidence and pride in what they are doing and the
integration of main-stream and special needs children is
seamless. The positive inclusion of all children is an
astonishing achievement and typically there is not a dry eye
among the audience watching.
Written by Juliette Tommons
(Parent Governor and representative from the
‘Healthy Schools Committee’) |
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